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Day: April 22, 2011

Just to let you know, I am working on implementing “share this” Facebook and Tweet buttons so FB and Twitter users can post links to either place directly from this site if they so choose. It’s probably the most requested feature for this blog. I’ve tried this before but threw my hands up in frustration.

It’s a trial and error process with me (mostly “error”!) because I am nowhere near to being a coding genius. So if things look a little off at the blog tonight, you know why. I’ve just about got it figured out, but it takes a lot longer than it should because when you implement something on your blog, it takes about 20 minutes before it actually takes effect for you to review. Grr.

SEATTLE — Self-proclaimed anarchists said on their website Friday that they are responsible for shattering multiple windows in a destructive spree at a Capitol Hill bank Thursday night.

Chase Bank said the vandalism at the branch at Broadway Avenue and Thomas Street is at least the third incident.

The vandals destroyed seven windows and the bank’s front door when they struck causing thousands of dollars in damages.

On the Pugetsoundanarchists website, a posting put up at 12:49 a.m. on Friday that said the group smashed in windows because banks are a “clear symbol of the misery and slavery that we experience under capitalism,” and also as a show of solidarity with Chilean anarchists on a hunger strike.

A picture posted on the site shows some of the bank’s broken windows.

Mark Jameson with Seattle police said they received several 911 calls from witnesses about 8:40 p.m. He said as many as six vandals wearing black clothing and hooded sweatshirts were trying to cover their faces with bandannas during the spree.

Police said the group left anarchist fliers at the bank with manifesto-type language and likely used hammers or sledgehammers to break out the windows before running away from the scene.

Make sure to click that link to check out pictures of the extensive damage these far left thugs inflicted on the banks in question. The Chilean hunger strikers they stand in “solidarity” with are also violently anti-capitalistic. No surprises there …

A few weeks ago, I wrote about the administration’s decision to look into the composition and leanings of the Libyan rebels — after we decided to go into battle for them.

That was stupid odd then, but now it’s taken an even stranger twist: two rival generals, one a CIA protege, claim to lead the rebel forces. And, while we’ve put drones into action against Qaddafi, we’ve cut off non-lethal aid … to our “allies?”

It’s no small matter to the US, either. Haftar appears to be the reason that the US feels sanguine enough to provide military and diplomatic support to the rebellion. After his defection, Haftar reportedly worked with the CIA to create and maintain a militia in Libya, according to a French book titled Manipulations Africaines. He only returned to Libya in the last few weeks, reportedly to “knock the rebel force into some kind of shape.”

That sanguine feeling appears to be dissipating, however. Foreign Policy reports that the White House has blocked the transfer of $25 million in “non-lethal” aid to the rebels, but isn’t sure why:

On April 15, the State Department notified Congress that it wanted to send $25 million of non-lethal military aid to the Libyan rebels, but as of today that money is being held up by the White House and no funds or goods have been disbursed. …

“One of the reasons why I announced $25 million in nonlethal aid yesterday, why many of our partners both in NATO and in the broader Contact Group are providing assistance to the opposition – is to enable them to defend themselves and to repulse the attacks by Qaddafi forces,” Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on this morning.

Suddenly, though, something more urgent has come up which has delayed that assistance. FP tried to find out why, but the White House won’t comment.

I’d be surprised if the White House did comment; presumably the CIA or another intel agency found out something they didn’t like. Perhaps they uncovered corruption, as in the diversion of aid to the pockets of one of the generals and his followers. Or maybe “our guy,” doesn’t have the influence he claimed, and we’re reluctant to support the other, who was Colonel Quackers’ Interior Minister? We were burned a bit by Iraqi exiles making big claims and failing to deliver after the liberation of Iraq, so maybe we’re gun-shy here? Perhaps the situation is so unclear, it’s impossible to tell right who is in charge. Or, maybe, the credible reports of an al Qaeda presence have turned out to be truer than we feared, and we’d just be funneling money to our sworn enemies?

There’s just no way of knowing why promised aid has suddenly been held up, without an explanation from Washington, which we’re unlikely to get. This does, however, bring up again a problem I pointed out in my earlier post and elsewhere: the decision to intervene in Libya was undertaken in a casual, haphazard, and slapdash manner with no real prep work or intelligence investigations beforehand. We went in with one eye closed, and now it looks like we’re uncovering things that… give us pause. There was no need for this rush, and proper leadership on the part of the people in charge (supposedly) would have seen that the preliminary work was done first, before committing American prestige, treasure, and lives to battle.

If there’s one thing Obama’s efforts overseas have shown us, it is that he is a Leftist ideologue who lacks a strategic vision and is in over his head. Whether it’s because of an innate passivity, a disinterest in foreign affairs, or a Left-liberal reluctance to act like an “imperial” and “colonial” power, our policy lacks any sense of coherence or strategy. I seriously doubt he has asked himself and his advisers “What outcome do we want?” From that one question would come answers that would shape the nature of our intervention, giving it direction and logical consistency. We would know how to proceed.

But I just don’t see that from Barack Obama, which means the outcome is likely to be muddled and costlier to reach than if we had acted with clarity and decisiveness when Daffy Qaddafi was still on the ropes.

Andrew Klavan brings us another in his series of public-service educational videos, this time to let us know how we should behave when Muslims go nuts over a perceived slight and kill a bunch of people — how do we stop it and keep it from happening again?

The answer is simple, my friends: we give up our principles. Enjoy the lesson.